[0:03] John Alof: [Music] we throw lawyer we can throw lawyers in there too good morning and welcome to the 2024 Farmington state of the city address Welcome to our audience here in person and those who are looking and watching online welcome I'm John Alof I am the President and chief Mission officer of the Dakota County Regional Chamber of Commerce the Dakota County Regional Chamber of Commerce serves as a local Chamber of Commerce for Farmington and nine other cities in Dakota County and three townships uh Farmington represents some of the fastest growth in our entire DCR region and today is a great example of the partnership that we have with a city which will continue to grow in 2024 and Beyond I took over my role with the DCR chamber a little over a year ago and I to be honest I didn't really know much about the city of Farmington but when I came into the role all of a sudden I started to learn a lot about Farmington my first trip down here was for a groundbreaking for the hawaa Broadband uh that is bringing Broadband to every home and every business and free Wi-Fi in the park s um I've never seen or heard that anywhere else or since and so all of a sudden said farmington's got it going on and um then the um uh we have the the beautiful building right next door was there for the ground babing for that and now that is the Emory right that is now up it's it's looking looking great so a lot of progress here but then the last thing was that just this morning when I pulled in there was a a gentleman walking up the street and he bent over to pick up a little piece of paper off the street and throw it in a trash can and I said holy moly what a town what a town um so thank to all of you have taken the time to attend today's program to hear about the great work in the city over the last year and what's in store for the future I also want to thank our sponsors they may be thanked more than once today and they should be Minnesota energy resources Castle Rock Bank and Midwest Bank of Farmington let's please recognize our sponsors for their [Applause] support because uh great coffee and great pastries don't grow on trees so thank you for the sponsor um lastly I do want to thank our elected officials for being here today um sometimes folks come that don't show up and so if you're an elected to a local regional state or federal office please rise so that we can recognize you [Applause] yeah and recently we were painfully all reminded of the sacrifices that our First Responders make and so please our First Responders that are in the room please also stand be recognized so we can thank you they make safe communities but as uh a head of a chamber of commerce I can tell you you don't get good business without safe communities so thank you it's now my honor to introduce your mayor Joshua Hoyt mayor Hoyt was previously a wrin winner to a Farmington City Council who does that who writes in and wins right he did um he is a Marine Corps veteran small business owner a speaker podcast podcaster mental health awareness activist serial volunteer and fundraiser as part of his volunteer work what amazing man he is he has walked to raise money he has wrestled to make money and he's kicked field goals in last year's DCR mayor's Cup last year he tied mayor weissel of Rosemont making 25 to 25 kicks made but he kicked in I think it was 10° weather and 40 mph winds and he'd still tied the mayor uh who kicked on a beautiful sunny day so this year things we have witnesses to verify the elements of the yeah uh so this year things will be different though right all right very good looking forward to that so please welcome a mayor whose advocacy for Farmington um around the county and the state is unwavering one of farmington's best and boldest mayor Joshua [Applause] [5:19] Mayor Joshua Hoyt: hyen a very gracious thank you very humbling I appreciate it though for those that are watching on TV do not adjust the contract I didn't get the memo about sunblock yesterday so it's not that warm in here I actually got a little burnt uh again it is my honor and it is a privilege to present to you the 2024 state of the city for the city of Farmington uh this presentation is available via live stream on the city of farmington's Facebook page the city of farmington's YouTube channel and also on Charter Spectrum 180 the state of the city is a look back over the previous year and a look ahead to celebrate our progress I will also provide insight into the work plan for this year as John mentioned our sponsors are Min Min I'm sorry Minnesota energy resources Castle Rock Bank and Min West Bank uh in attendance we have the Nikolai family and we also have Neil Anderson from in Westbank if we could please give them another round of [Applause] applause thank you to the Dakota County Regional Chamber of Commerce for your continued support and for your dedication to the many businesses and organizations across Dakota County we appreciate [Applause] you thank you to my peers the city council council members Steve Wilson Nick Lien, Holly Bernatz and Katie Porter not in attendance uh for your collaboration for all the hard work that we do throughout the year and for most importantly for empowering and supporting the team that is the organization at the city of Arington so thank [Applause] you thank you to our city administrator Lynn Gorski uh Lynn you lead our organization with empathy with trust and with Integrity you are amazing thank [Applause] you all right we won't have to do a whole lot more clapping so we're good there uh this presentation won't be it couldn't be possible without the collaborative support support of a very small but very impactful team uh we have our Communications team of Karin Tim and Harry we have our IT director Peter Gilbertson our engineering GIS specialist Danny Olsen again I I couldn't do this without you so thank you for everything that you did to make today possible uh in attendance okay we're good we're good uh in attendance we also have our Dakota County Commissioner Mike Slavic Mike your your representation is admirable um how you collaborate with our team and within the County board for all things Farmington um from safety improvements to improvements to our Parks uh you're just you're steadfast in everything that you do so thank you very much for for everything on behalf of all the residents of Farmington thank you and Wendy our met Council representative you're doing it on a much larger scale Statewide um I I wish there was more directly that we could do work together but we're we're doing everything that we can and uh we applaud everything that you do for us in our residents at the state level so thank you [Applause] ma'am this year we welcomed a new director to our senior leadership team Kim Sommerland was hired as our finance director she Dove right in she made the transition virtually seamless uh Kim we appreciate your patience and your commitment to our financial Excellence we also welcome Shirley Buecksler as our new city clerk Shirley you're you're incredible woman your passion for accuracy uh and your work is just overall impressive thank you we also added 17 new members to team Farmington they're pictured throughout based on their departments with their addition to our team we are stronger and we are more effective as an organization their contributions will continue to increase our standard of core Service delivery and we are all better with them on our team now in my previous state of the city presentations I've been very intentional on how we told our story and why Farmington is unique we have small town small town charm we have historical characteristics and who we are is as important as who we will look like in the coming years in 2021 I talked a lot about our team the experience and the year the thousands of years of experience that we had within our team in 22 we talked about our our anniversary our 150th being the second oldest city in Dakota County last year it was about transition it was about building our team it was about new senior leadership elevating our standards and moving forward to meet the needs of our residents and our businesses across our community this year we're going to talk about our progress we're going to talk about how we build on our success ESS our city count our city council priorities are our pillar these are the foundation in everything that we do how we operate how we conduct ourselves where we put our time effort and our energy and we focused them into four very distinct pillars that should not change these should continue to remain the foundation of the city of Farmington in years to come we have Employee Engagement culture and Wellness frankly because you have to have a team you cannot do any work without a high performing team we have infrastructure support how do we support everybody internally and externally we have Community engagement we have quality business growth and retention we can achieve Excellence when we have highly skilled individuals that work collaboratively as a talented team we have clearly defined expectations and processes we have collaboration and we have effective communication our team is committed to data-driven decisionmaking and the highest standard of core Service delivery The Guiding principles for our Employee Engagement culture and wellness are to ensure that all employees feel empowered valued and appreciated to promote employee collaboration and to create a respectful and trusting work environment our engagement involves award Banquets for our police and fire departments it's our ability to recognize them for not only years of service but also performance and achievements we hold annual employee recognition events and summer cookouts to show our appreciation to our team our our conduct and our culture is done through surveys we continue to engage our team through culture surveys to understand where we are how we can improve we listen and we implement changes as needed it's the most important piece as we listen to what our team says and we act on it our safety and wellness committee is passionate about working to educate and inform our team on all of the resources that are available to them again really driving home the wellness piece this is a small slide of our team throughout the year in various situations and events it's a nice little way to to see how we show up as a team under infrastructure support our guiding principles are to provide the highest level of core Service delivery it's also to meet industry standards for Capital Improvement planning that's to meet industry standards in order for us to meet our standards we need to have the awareness and the recognition that we were not meeting the standards so our commitment starts there it starts at getting to the standard and meeting it and then it involves the work and determination as to where we want to go in elevating our standards for core Service delivery several key components to ensure that we can do this recruitment development and retaining key Talent evaluating our staffing models in capacity and adapting in real time we need to have consistency because with retirements and Leadership changes you have to maintain that experience Capital we Implement new software new programs across all departments that allow our team to be more more effective in their ability to best serve our residents we need to ensure that our facilities are maintained our team needs the right equipment to meet the changing needs of our residents and our businesses we need to hire with values that align with our pillars we need to train and equip with the resources needed to deliver on that promise again clearly defined expectations for our team our residents expect something we need to expect that of our team to make that delivery possible and we need to communicate effectively and give them time to complete the task that we want let's get into our Rambling River Center our Rambling River Center is an invaluable asset to our community this is a second home for our aging adults this is where they feel connected to each other this is where they can be active participate in programs and events but it's not just for our aging adults membership might require an age but participation does not this is a place where our community can continue to connect with other residents through events and programming last year through the congressionally directed spending congresswoman Angie Craig senator Amy Klobuchar and Senator Tina Smith helped secure $750,000 through Community Project funding to bring enhancements that are decades overdue at our ring River Center we talked about the award last year now we're starting to put it into action between our Rambling River Center Advisory Board the park and recck board and the city council we have worked through various options as to how we want to proceed we talked about multiple phases we talked about doing this over an extended period of time to try and lessen a financial burden on our community but at the end of the day we realized that the most important thing was the residents and the members of our of our Center being in the center and to displace them for the shortest amount of time so we've committed and we've given the direction to our team to proceed with this project in one phase this project is has been through concept which you've seen here a few pictures to to depict a few of the areas and what they'll look like with their enhancements but more importantly that this construction is going to start as early as September with an anticipated completion of April or May 2025 so we're going to get in get the work done and get out and get our residents back to the place that they love to spend spend their time a few components about the Rambling River Center enhancements here number one is the Outdoor the enhanced outdoor area uh with the gracious donation from Min West Bank of $50,000 uh we're able to put additional funds and resources into enhancing that outdoor space to better balance the needs of our residents and the members of the center within our garage area we're going to expand the fitness center we're going to move from a three-stall garage into a two are into a single stall garage and take up two of those stalls to grow out the size of the fitness center again aging adults being active in the center is vital to not only their physical and mental health but it's also vital to the the continued vibrancy and utilization of the center the fitness center is one way that we'll accomplish that again a huge thanks to the park and wreck board and the Rambling River advisory commission for all of the hard work that we've done over the last year to get this to a point where we're ready to build now congresswoman Craig could not be here today uh she's out in Washington advocating on behalf I believe there may be a few members of her team here um but she sent us a little video so let's spend about 90 seconds listening to what the congresswoman says [17:46] Congresswoman Angie Craig (Video): good morning everyone I'm back in Washington with votes I would have loved to join you all in person to hear mayor Ho's address today I just wanted to take a moment to thank Josh for his continued partnership throughout the years we we've hosted Town Halls together work side by side to bring home $750,000 in federal funding to make the Rambling River and exterior Plaza accessible for seniors and we've called on USPS to build a new post office to improve mail service for Farmington residents this year we secured critical Federal funding for the Farmington Police Department's security infrastructure making our community safer in the long term there there are so many exciting things happening here in Farmington lots of projects and initiatives coming soon and we're working hard to build these development opportunities here in the city to strengthen our local economy along with many of you I'm excited to hear more from the mayor about what we've already done and all that we're going to get done this year I look so forward to working on so much of it with all of you and a final thank you to Josh for his wrestling experience to raise money here in our city and I don't know if all of you know this but from now on he is Mayor Mayhem okay that's two wrestling references there will be no more neither of them was mine [19:19] Mayor Joshua Hoyt: as the congresswoman stated uh in the congressionally directed spending we have secured $869,000 for our Police Department to ensure that we have the critical safety enhancements for our Police Department our assets and our vehicles Council in conjunction with our planning team will start working on the feasibility of of how to incorporate this additional funding into the the needs assessment that we have in the terms of a police department expansion uh we need to look at what that entails over the next few years um but clearly we need to use our funds in the most reasonable way possible and we couldn't do it without an additional almost million dollars so huge congresswoman Craig and and our Senators continue to advocate for Farmington um it's unbelievable to see what they're they're able to do at the federal level to redirect that money and bring it back into the community it allows us to continue to enhance our services protect our critical infrastructure uh and it wouldn't be possible without their advocacy so a huge thank you to to the congresswoman and her team um again we we would not be able to do it without her staying in infrastructure support one of our guiding principles was meeting industry standards for Capital Improvement planning this is about where we're at to use datadriven decision-making we need to compile the data so last year we embarked on a a couple of Fairly bold initiatives we started with our pavement condition index we went through and we will be indexing every road through the entire Community every other year basically we'll do the whole Community year one and year two so we're accomplishing that on top of our Trails will be done in two to threee Cycles this gives us a rating scale of 0 to 100 to help the city council prioritize the standard that we need so for example our average roads may come out to be a 79 if the city says we want our roads to be an 85 we want them to exceed standards then we'll set that in policy and that'll be the direction for our road construction work to be done but we had to start with an assessment so there's no arbitrary decisions about we're going to this road or this road we're looking at pavement condition first traffic impact uh Community impact uh tree removals all of the other pieces and then collaborating within our with our Community Partners to ensure that we can do these projects in a timely and um responsible manner more than anything we're also doing that with our facilities condition assessment we went through Citywide and we looked at all of our facilities and we we laid out a a 10-year plan uh if you take the police expansion out of that which is approximately 20 million there's $18 million that's left over the next decade that needs to be reinvested into our city facilities again we don't want to make arbitrary decisions they need to be D data driven so by compiling this facilities assessment it's going to allow us to best use the dollars in the most expeditious manner to ensure that we maintain our critical infrastructure components we're also doing a 10-year Street plan by pulling this data in it allows us to forecast out further than just one or two years at a time we can plan 10 years worth of road work uh in real time it also gives us a more balanced and secure long-term financial plan it's the most important thing for our residents and our businesses is where are their tax dollars going how are their tax dollars being spent we have been elected and entrusted with the responsibility of being the best stewards for those dollars and by using data data driven decisionmaking we can do that for our residents and our businesses it also increases our standard at the same time it gives us a baseline to work off of we can say we want it here now we're going to meet the standard but now we want to increase it and how do we do that we have levers that we can go in and pull to use that data to drive those processes once we meet our standards we're going to determine how we we plan to exceed them speaking of last year's projects long overdue was our aen road project this was completed late 2023 there is a a final completion walkthr through that was done this spring there's a a Reclamation and widening of portions of the path on the east side of Aken Road uh several areas also had curb added this is going to allow for better uh better drainage of our our storm water and our rain water uh huge Improvement long overdue um speed limit still 45 we're good there uh another project that we wrapped in uh to 23 but finished up early 24 was the Spruce Street and division project this was also coupled with the parking lot work that was done on the west side of the arena and the new parking lot that was built on the east side again we got about 90% of the way there uh there were a few safety improvements that we had to make so when you look at the pillars that are on the south side of the Arena you'll notice that the three pillars to the West got cut down that was because in design when you look at it everything works and then when you go to real time we realized it didn't so for residents again we listen and we react when residents were telling us us you can't see when you leave there's an obstruction from headlights uh headed westbound on Spruce we had to go in and cut those down to increase that line of sight for pedestrian and driver safety um the emphasis obviously is always on pedestrian and driver safety a major collaboration project that we finally got done again a decade Plus in the making uh working with Dakota County Mike Slavic um the rest of the Commissioners to help at the funds to make a long overdue safety Improvement now we know this is not the long-term solution but we all mutually agreed that doing nothing wasn't an option so we had to do something listen to Engineers looked at the traffic looked at the information and we made a fact-based decision to ensure that the improvements could be achieved without committing a substantial amount of money knowing that development is going to drive the next piece as that development happens it could turn into a roundabout or a stoplight most likely a stoplight when that happens will be dictated based on development not the city not the school not the county not the state nobody else is going to determine when that happens until development occurs and warrants the necessary improvements but to keep safety as a priority for not only our pedestrians but our drivers in the area I'm not going to say any more on that talking about our 2024 projects you know I started in 2019 was my first year elected and I remember when we did West viiew Acres it was the first road reconstruction project that we had done in five or six years we started picking away at at one at a time little projects right now that we've got our data now that we have the information we can really push Full Ahead using that data to make good decisions so in 2024 we have a total of three Street Recon reconstruction projects primarily Maple and 6th Street so for those that are unfamiliar with the area this would be on the North and the east side of Farmington Elementary downtown uh there will be a road width change there will be some tree removals enhancements to um pedestrian walkways um but we also have six millon overlay projects there will be seven streets involved we have Spruce and 9th Street 23th Street West those are both downtown in the industrial park much to the um let's just say everyone in industrial park is going to be extremely happy that this is finally happening this is something again was probably a decade and a half in the making but 208 Street in Eaton Avenue uh will have a millon overlay done as you move into North Farmington you'll have a a pretty significant section of Embers Avenue you'll also have Embry Avenue a section of uclid path and uid Street and a and an upper 182nd Street as well now those projects are in the planning we've gone through our specs and our schedule but we're already starting on 25 so by getting the information earlier in the process it allows us to accelerate the planning process which allows us to communicate with residents businesses and affected areas earlier in that cycle and we're not having those conversations in August September October that construction starts in in the spring so again you see a lot of the things that I'm saying are leading back into our pillars it's not just what we do it's why we're doing it and the benefit that that that process gives us something nobody wants to talk about is our trees Emerald ashbo much like Dutch Elm was in its day we're dealing with Emerald ashbo this is not a comfortable conversation we are a tree City Tree City USA we we get we get the recognition every year but you're taking down your trees you're right there's there's a species that got out there a bug that got into trees that is doing damage at rates that no one could predict what did we find we didn't have enough diversity in our trees we had far too many ash trees so we now that we have this information this data we can go back and better plan but how do we deal with what's what is happening in real time we had to go through and do a tree inventory our last tree inventory was done in 2016 with the addition of Ed Rage our natural resource specialist going back and re-evaluating that data we learned that it was not only incomplete but it was inaccurate it additionally we had an e an escalation of time for the Decay and some trees that were being treated could no longer be treated and had to be removed so this is something that we're dealing with in real time the net net of it is there are 3600 3,600 Boulevard trees that need to come down that's not counting Parks that's not counting trails that total number could be tens of thousands but we have to handle pedestrian and driver safety first which is why we're emphasizing some time in Parks but Boulevard trees 3600 trees the city council is going to continue God willing and Council approving the continuation of $600,000 per year for the next five years that's $3 million that our community is going to have to invest in just the removal of trees and stumps that does not include reforestation that does not include replanting trees we've been working through work sessions again with the help of Ed Rage our natural our natural resource specialist to identify a diverse mix of trees that we can plan to ensure that we don't have all maples down one Boulevard that God forbid something happens and maples have to come down we lose an entire Boulevard of trees we have to diversify this mix we have to secure funding sources we're working on grants and ways that we can go out and secure outside funding to ensure that we have uh the earmarks for a dedicated reforestation plan the thing that we're going to ask the most is for your patients please be patient we don't want to take these trees down we don't but we have to um the timing is going to change some of these trees we've been treating and planning for a few years thinking that they're going to come down in 10 years and as we're doing our annual reinspect we're finding out that it might be a two to a three-year Plan before it comes out but we're using data a current inventory system to make sure that we can use our tax dollars the best way we can to solve our problem but do it in an expeditious manner let's get back to Good News the Rambling River Park this time the Rambling River Park and fely fields are the gateway to our downtown they are the most visible heavily used but yet they are the most aged and in need of update parks that we have we started Master planning the end of 22 when we pivoted from Jim Bell Park and preserve and we had received our community feedback about the needs that our community had what types of amenities what types of activities we listened to what they told us realized that we couldn't go out and and commit financially to Jim Bell so we pivoted back to what we have enhance what we know needed to be improved on what needed to be invested on and we utilize that information to make good decisions um that again that Master planning started the end of 22 worked through 23 uh this concept plan has significant upgrades upgrades to the paths and trails uh working with Dakota County on a potential trail head um we also had our park and wreck board collaborate with residents on new surveys and new engagement to implement what we're being told we were told to reinvest in our Parks because it's it's one of the number one reasons that people like to call Farmington home so we're going to continue to put our money back there some of the construction that you've seen happen is what you would used to refer to as our tennis courts so those tennis courts came down there is new equipment on site we are going to construct an all-inclusive playground this all-inclusive playground will have a hard rubber surface it will ensure Ada accessibility it's going to meet the diverse needs of our community and its residents it also is being set back from the Vermilion river that for many of us who have been here for decades know when the River Rises it floods the park and you can't use a park that's flooded so we're moving it to Higher Ground creating uh greater accessibility and keeping it away from uh the 100-year storms that we end up having but this one's in process and on your way out of town please uh make it a point to drive through there and check it out it's a pretty substantial area it's going to be amazing when it's completed the rest of the components of the park we're looking at securing financing for ultimately we need to figure out how we're going to fund it um most recently we we submitted for some grants that allow us to pull forward major components uh one of those being the skate park so we we went out for a grant that hopefully we'll get um I was told not to say that because if we don't get it I'm going to look stupid but we got to have some good stuff in there too staying in infrastructure support let's talk a minute about information technology and fiber back in 2019 when I started I recognized that we had a lot of core infrastructure here we had power we had water we had sewer we had major met Council collectors we had large gas lines 4in 6 inch lines we didn't have a lot of fiber we had some County Assets in the community but we didn't have the buil it we didn't have it built out the way that we needed it so we had to figure out how to how to get in front of this partner with someone that would come in and offer competition for our residents ultimately be an additional Economic Development tool but something that we could enhance our services our one of our number one features and that's our parks and our Trails so last year HBC started what it was initially a 36-month buildout that they're targeting to be done early to mid 25 so this project could be 24 to 30 months by the time it's finished it's going to ensure that there is fiber accessibility to every home and Business border to border within the community it's also going to offer additional competition because what happens when we have competition the standard of service is increased everybody is forced to get better it's not just going to drive prices down it will ensure that the standard of service is increased um within our Parks we used arpa funding and we allocated funds so that 20 of our 29 Parks will have a free secure network for Wi-Fi so as we're making enhancements to our parks and as our residents and and visitors of our community are coming into our Parks they have accessibility to Wi-Fi again better serving the underserved um ensuring that that we can offer enhanced Services geocaching um Waypoint mapping all the all the things you can use technology to benefit from we couldn't let technology be a roadblock for that so in a few of our Parks specifically ramling River Park you're going to see polls go up power pedestals go in place um that's the beginning part of of the needed infrastructure to ensure that we can offer that service um but by late summer early fall we should have Rambling River Park and fely Fields online so big project 24 months but we're moving forward just a quick list of the parks for anyone that wants to see it after the fact we do have all this information on our website um but 20 of the 29 that we have throughout the community will have Park fiber in them let's talk about Community engagement our guiding principles of community engagement are to increase transparency in city government they're to communicate effectively and they're to enhance the Outreach and create tools to encourage resident engagement our Council and our entire team continue to show up we have highfrequency resident engagement because it's an opportunity for us to not only educate but inform our residents and business owners this is positive involvement in many community events it's a way that we can collaborate with all of our Community Partners we can continue to build trust Foster relationships for all of our residents we utilize things like our current quarterly newsletter we have a new City website I've mentioned the surveys a few times we will continue to engage our residents and our business owners with surveys to listen to what they tell us and act on it and speaking of a new website this went live about a week ago our website was slightly archaic this new version it's much cleaner much easier to use it is is far more efficient for our residents our businesses for those that coming into Farmington can find the information quickly we have integration with our GIS mapping which allows us to do project updates in real time we have an unbelievable GIS specialist and Danny and she loves taking the information and putting it into a visual format we can embed into our website and use QR codes so as we're talking about program programming and events people have access through our currents placards whatever it may be they'll see the QR code goes right to the website interactive update for projects Economic Development opportunities commercial real estate scheduling for programs um and for our residents the Farmington fix portion because Farmington fix is finally fixed it wasn't being used the way that we intended it we know what we wanted we wanted to hear from residents we wanted to know what are the problems where are they at how does it affect you who can solve it and how fast can we solve it it's a process we have to work through that phone calls were going to the front desk sometimes stuff gets Lost in Translation bad information in bad information out by incorporating incorporating a new Farmington fix we're able to narrow down the key items that our residents tell us need to be addressed those are items like code enforcement fire code uh Parks roads snow and ice trees utility even the website there's a problem with the website put a Farmington fix in on the Farmington website hopefully it's not the Farmington fix that you're a fix ticket on but we're trying to we're trying to clear this we're trying to make it more concise more understandable but more importantly usable if it's not used it's worthless so we encourage people to utilize the Farmington fix and help us improve our service delivery across the board this is a few pictures of our community engagement this is our team throughout various events during the year uh our our team just continues to show up you know not just EDS not just appointed top to bottom left to right our team continues to show up we continue to collaborate with residents business owners nonprofits religious groups and organizations we attend as many events as we can we understand the stress and the burden that that puts on our team to continue to do that uh because a lot of times those events are outside of working hours but there is not a single person who won't do it they understand the value to the community they understand what being a member of Team Farmington means and they continue to commit to the community engagement because they know it's what makes us most special this is a very very very small way to show the ways that we get involved in our community now the thing that youall been waiting for little quality business growth and retention our guiding principles are to enhance business activities to positively position Farmington to not only welcome support and attract new development that helps diversify our our tax base it is also to maintain and grow relationships in 2023 our team embarked on the unexpectedly bold campaign to positively promote Farmington we wanted to celebrate our past but we also wanted to boldly Define our future we needed to meet people where they were at we needed to go out the wait for it to happen wasn't working so there were tools and resources we put in place to ensure that our team could go out and actively promote Farmington in the most positive way as a result of that now mind you the three people I'm going to mention next have been with the city of Farmington for less than 18 months in 18 months their work outside of the community of Farmington has drawn so much attention that even this state of the city had 30 people in it the first year I did it and we have double that today they continue to show up at events and they know that Farmington as a community that people can choose to live work and play in Deanna Kuennen our community development director was awarded the Minnesota real estate Journal economic developer of the Year award she was also a uh the city of Farmington was a finalist for the Minnesota real estate Journal city of the Year Stephanie our Economic Development coordinator was awarded the Economic Development Association of Minnesota's emerging professional of the Year award Jared our planning coordinator was awarded I'm sorry he was a finalist my Jared where you at my bad I got I was sitting next to you when that happened he was a finalist for the St Paul area Chamber Of commer leaders in local government Rising Star it was a finalist lost to St Paul I mean come on right the city of Farmington though we were also in that same St Paul area Chamber of Commerce um the city of Farmington was a finalist in the communications and marketing campaign for our unexpectedly bold campaign again we're getting recognized because we're showing up we're putting in the work people are seeing it we know our value now they know the value and now they're coming this way and we're starting to see that happen throughout the community I can't forget Tony though because Tony has been our planning manager for TW over 20 years he's going to have a a award cabinet for 2024 you're in next year's slides my friend that that team though I mean in all seriousness um they do the work every day they're out there proactively promoting our community showing them what tools and resources are available beyond the natural resources beyond the utilities beyond the things that make the project work they're showing up and talking about our people talking about our community how we collaborate and how we work together and why Farmington is an amazing Community to not only live work but also establish your business in and their showing up is absolutely changing the score let's give them a round of [Applause] applause this is rnl carriers rnl carriers is a longstanding transportation business within our industrial park they are one of our top employers who have hundreds of employees rnl carriers continues to reinvest and call Farmington home later this year rnl will start a 100,000 foot expansion they will occupy the property between the existing site and Pilot Knob Road the larger shaded portion is a storm water retention Pond Transportation companies have a lot of surface area coverage so hence the addition of a storm water retention Pond but rnl is a significant contributor to our community they are a significant transportation business long-standing that has shown a reason to continue to invest in our community they are also proof that Farmington is not too far from an interstate we have our Emory. The Emory was an Ebert construction significant multifamily investment in our downtown historic district this project took an older property that was not being properly used what frankly it was an eyesore and they're investing tens of millions of dollars into our downtown district this project while it might be a little uncomfortable for those that have been in the community a long time this project over time will prove to be one of the single greatest Investments That Happened downtown again tens of millions of dollars 74 units one in two-bedroom 74 plus residents downtown Within hundreds of feet of all of our downtown businesses that is a major win by any playbook in Economic Development it is market rate the numbers published have been anywhere between $1,600 and $1,900 a month it offers competition it offers the ability for competition and the quality of service to be raised it's good for our residents and again it provides that long-term stability in our downtown district these buildings don't just disappear they stay here for a long time it supports our downtown Redevelopment plan it shows other developers that we know how to do tax increment financing projects and it shows them that we know how to get this work done our community has a capacity current um we we have a current capacity or what they we call an absorption rate of 400 units so the city of Farmington can absorb 400 Condo or apartment units this is 74 you will see more projects coming number one because the community needs it and two it helps drive other things within Economic Development um your employers need Workforce right you have an employer that's looking at jobs between $18 and $24 an hour you can't afford a single family home in Farmington so as you look across the community and you see this diversification of our housing mix it's so that we can meet at price points that offer a new home to our residents and signal to perspective and current employers that their Workforce is here in town they don't need to bring them in from 10 15 30 miles away that is a significant win for this community but I understand it's different change is different we have to get comfortable with that if you want the businesses you have to meet some of these needs and diversifying our housing mix is a significant way for us to do that we're going to get a little uncomfortable let's talk about opportunities for a second late last year the city of Farmington was working with the Castle Rock Township on a new technology park opportunity these types of opportunities in our region have the potential to bring a generational impact to many parts of our community land owners our communities and our school district technology parks are a critical component of our infrastructure specifically moving forward these opportunities provide well-paying jobs they have minimal traffic at the site once completed they have very little dependency on public safety and saf and city services but they also create the ideal tax diversity that all of our communities have longed for now this most recent project hasn't moved forward however we will continue to see more opportunities come forth our infrastructure is prime for it we have all of the key components it is inevitable that we will see more of this come in the years to come we as communities have to continue to find ways to work together to put these projects on the map an example of the financial impact now this might be hard to see in person so I'll summarize it for you here's an example this is just one project in estimations a 300 acre parcel over six years has a $70,000 tax impact a technology park over the same six-year period of time has an estimated $8.7 million in those same six years it's not all about money but that helps it's about continuity with the landscape it's about setbacks and appropriation of zoning there are a lot of components that make these projects work but we have a lot of needs in the community the Greater Community and we have a significant draw to these larger projects we have to figure out a way to put them together I don't think anybody would disagree that we all know we're going somewhere we all know that we're going somewhere that has Prosperity it has balance it has diversification of our taxes how we get there might be a little bit of a disagreement but we all agree we want to go to the same place so let's start collaborating and working together to get to that place because everybody ultimately benefits IT projects don't happen High Lev course Services don't happen unless you can put those projects together um I won't dwell on that anymore I wanted to draw a bigger picture here because it was important that especially for me over the last four years and and telling the story of our community we're in the weeds every day we are in the weeds every single day we live here we work here we don't step outside and look at the bigger picture one of our guiding principles is to maintain and grow relationships we need to diversify our tax base this is a complex problem that requires a complex and collaborative solution the map to my left here shows the city of Farmington within the school district for Simplicity the green is current agricultural land use the yellow is non commercial industrial land use the red is current commercial and Industrial so red is commercial yellow is not green is egg this is a visual representation to the size and scale of where we are today and the opportunities that we have in front of us I do want you to take special attention and time to notice the small amount of red which is the smaller amount of commercial industrial land use across the district this is a greater Community need not a mutually exclusive Farmington problem to solve we have to collaborate across the district and across their communities because ultimately our district serves all of our communities I'm going to bring this down a little bit this is just the city of Farmington so just within the city of Farmington colors are still the same yellow represents current non-commercial industrial so residential Open Spaces rways all of that green is agricultural red is current commercial industrial the few pieces of brown in there are egg preserve there's limited use there's guidance that's regulations that that don't allow things to happen there right away but the crosshatch section the part that looks like a black vinyl fence there that's the overlay for our current 2040 comprehensive planned use for commercial industrial this is basically a Target this is where our team is going out and saying this is currently planned commercial industrial these are the areas that we need to best guide this is where our concentration of time effort and energy needs to be is in that crosshatch section which is pretty much right on our Industrial Park Highway 50 kind of West of Pilot Knob east of Flagstaff it's kind of it's cornered in that area that's where where our primary focus is right now but in work session with my peers we understood that's not enough it's not enough area it's not enough to make sure that we can balance our taxes in future years to meet the rising needs of our residents and our businesses so what we did was we got a little bit deeper we tried to better understand how do we add more commercial industrial more mixed use into our 20 240 comprehensive plan again as a percentage Farmington is 100% land 54% of it is developed that leaves 46% undeveloped of that 46 only five is currently marked for future commercial industrial expansion only 5% that's a very small percentage relatively speaking within the city of Farmington we recognize that we need to add more so we're going to do some midcycle updates we've already started talking about how we're going to Overlay in different areas knowing that development will dictate this you have the need of infrastructure that will be built basically from the center out we have to work with met Council in the Musa boundary there's a lot of things that have to go into play but the most important thing to take away from this is we recognize the need and we are proactively working to fix it complex problem complex solution but we're getting there um it will ultimately it will end up diversifying the tax base in the way that our residents need but the one thing that we cannot forget is that we can't get this wrong the cost of redev Redevelopment is significant so when you have raw land you have new opportunities for development we we cannot get this wrong uh we have to do it in a controlled way that makes sense for all entities we have to recognize the needs of our school district but we do have to continue to collaborate with our bordering communities we have to work within our current annexation agreements we need to guide development that relieves that burden uh for both our residents and our businesses when we do so we'll be just fine so in closing I just want to hit a couple of notes here real quick um this all happens with a team and I can't emphasize that enough you can have all the plans in the world you can have all the great intentions in the world you can you can think up all the possible scenarios but if you don't have a team that's bought into your vision where you are where you're going how you're going to get there if they're not empowered the work can't happen as we work through this process we have to retain that key Talent we have to make sure that these experienced and tenur professionals who have made a choice to come to the city of Farmington continue to choose the city of Farmington to grow through all of these problems it's an issue we've had in the past and it's one that I hope we don't ever have again because the team that works here right now is unbelievable and they're showing up and outside of our borders everybody sees that they recognize it and they're supportive and they want to collaborate with us but our community is more than just buildings and houses our community is about the people that choose to live here their families their businesses and how they support each other we continue to show up for each other whenever we're called nonprofits fundraisers the needs whatever it is Farmington always shows up for each other Farmington picks up the trash when they walk through downtown we support everybody in every way that we can because that's what makes us unique and special we're also a community where the sound of the siren is different the sound of our first responder sirens is different because of how we support our police our fire our EMTs and our paramedics in Farmington that sound is different because we know that our residents are on both ends of that c they're the ones that are jumping in the trucks hauling butt down the road but they're also the ones on the other end that picked up the phone and called for help so it's always going to sound different here and we will make sure that our teams are equipped prepared trained and have the adequate resources to continue to do their job because our residents are on the other end of that call wanting them to show up as quickly as possible in a time of need now how our community looks and how we move forward it's going to change we talked about this last year it's going to be uncomfortable things are just going to start to look different but Farmington is going to continue to involve into this thriving opportunity of where our residents want to live work and play we listen to what residents tell us and we act on it our residents want value for their tax dollars at the same time though they want great roads they want great paths they want high level core Service delivery our residents want places of employment they want places to spend their hardening income we hear you we hear all of you and we're we are going to continue to work to build that thriving community that we all know Farmington can and will be our team will continue to positively promote Farmington with prospective developers and opportunities from outside of our our borders currently we have several hundred acres under pending purchase agreements these are for multiple projects significant in size amongst a variety of Industries it is happening we've seen it in the last year we're going to see it in the next few weeks we're going to see it in the next few months and we're going to see it in the next few years it's happening but it's going to happen fast we're seeing it at a different pace in our in our bordering communities the Lakeville and the Rosemonts they just keep blowing up farmington's not avoidable it's happening it's coming be prepared for it because it when this change starts we're going to Blink and our Landscapes look a lot different we have to continue to support our existing businesses they're the ones that continue to support us they support our organizations our nonprofits and our causes when we went through covid we did not lose one storefront our community stood up protected all of them we didn't have a single storefront that shut in the 18-month period of time of covid that's how we take care of our people that's how we're going to continue to take care of our people moving forward we're going to continue to diversify our housing mix by adding options Beyond single family again this continues to attract commercial and Industrial Development it attracts additional employers and it's going to provide them with the workforce housing that they ultimately need to thrive but our growth places new demands on our core Services we have to continue to plan plan further into the future we have to look at the rising needs of our community and its residents but most importantly we have to hold on to our most invaluable asset and that's our people that's our commitment to one another for the betterment of our community it's what makes Farmington special we can celebrate our past while at the same time boldly defining our future because this is Farmington thank you [Applause] [Music] [1:01:13] [Music]